Love Traveler : Greetings, What does "God created time" mean?

If "God created time", when did this happen? Was there a time before which there was no time? It also appears for God to be the cause of anything, God needs to temporally precede the thing. If the thing in question is time itself, "God created time" is self-refuting.

'Ali : Time = God's act of creating. in other words "God created his act of creating".

Love Traveler : can you explain it further with more senses?

'Ali : I think this make much more sense. Imam Ja'far As-Shadiq (Alayhissallam) said: "Allah created the Will itself, then created everything by means of the Will"

Love Traveler : Very interesting. Thanks for sharing this hadith. I would like to know what is meant by "Will".

'Ali : There was one companion who asked Imam al-Kadhim (Alayhissallam) the following question: "Inform me about the Will. Is it part of Allah or is it of the Creation?"

He (Alayhissallam) Answered:

"The will is part of the created conscience, and it manifests itself in action. As for the Will of Allah , then it is His Making (ihdath) and none other than that because He does not reflect, does not imagine, and does not think. These attributes cannot be applied to Him as they are attributes of creation. Thus, Allah's Will is action and nothing else. He says to it: "Be and it is", without a word or speech expressed by tongue, by imagination or by thought. His Will is expressed withouth form in the same way that He is withouth form."

Love Traveler : This makes sense.

So if "time = God's act of creation" is that each moment is God's act. And so each new moment is God's new act.

In other words, creation is not in time but rather creation is itself time, or time is itself creation. creation is not something static. Rather, creation is itself the act of creating. There isn't anything created; there is just the act of creating.

Only in our "minds" do we see a "static creation" but in reality this creation is not static, it is constantly being renewed every moment and constantly being created.

So the relationship between the created and the creator is not like that between the building and the builder where the two can be exist separately. It is more like the relationship between light and objects it brings into light from darkness.

Fathima : I was thinking about this on the way to work actually. Sometime, somewhere I've read that anything we see in ourselves and in the physical world could be related to our souls and the immaterial world. So, the cells in our bodies are continously dying and replaced by new ones being formed, hence you get physical development, growth, etc.

Could this, in fact, support Mulla Sadra's theosophical concept of constant renewal in possible material beings? and the fact that we're bound by a 4th dimension called time?

Love Traveler : For Mulla Sadra, the reason why our souls are able to change is precisely because of this transsubstantial motion (haraka-al jawhariyyah). We dont have to go to the level of cell to know that our bodies are changing. We started off as a piece of flesh (material soul), then we developed into a vegetal soul, and then into an animal soul, and then into a rational soul. Each prior phase is the matter in relation to the subsequent phase. So the vegetal soul is matter in relation to the animal soul. the animal soul is matter in relation to the rational soul. The animal soul is soul in relation to the vegetal soul. In other words, the perfection of anything is its soul. The famous saying of Mulla Sadra is that "the soul is material in origination, and spiritual in subsistence".

Ibn Arabi also talks about this notion of trans-substantial without using the name "trans-substantial" motion. And Buddhists (like Dogen) talk about this as well. It is a universal doctrine unveiled to all those who have reached "realization".